Shannen: Good points regarding that Brooks column. It’s the new conventional wisdom that Romney has to change his strategy to deal with the ascendance of Perry. I’m with Ross on this being entirely wrong-headed. Romney should only attack Perry now if he wants to be the new Tim Pawlenty, prematurely picking a fight that he can’t possibly win with a candidate on the rise.
Perry has weak spots — aspects of his gubernatorial record, changing positions on the issues, etc. — but Romney can’t focus on any of them without exposing more serious vulnerabilities of his own. Ultimately, Romney’s strongest argument may be the electability argument, but it’s way too early to make it. So he should sit tight and try — to the extent he can — to continue to stay above the fray. There are candidates who will have much more credibility to challenge Perry — Bachmann, and Palin if she were to get in — than he does.
He has to hope that the initial ardor for Perry cools, that the Texas governor gets dinged up by the other candidates, and that when it comes crunch time right before the primary voting actually begins, he looks substantially more electable. For Romney, Reagan’s admonition applies: “Don’t just do something, stand there.”
As long as Romney has you, Ramesh, and K-Lo in the bag, his victory is assured, right, Rich?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDon't forget hugh hewitt.
When perry polls 20 points ahead of romney, kjl and hewitt will find a way to exlaim "This helps romney!!!"
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYou are so money, Beau, you ought to be nicknamed The Fed.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI suppose it's pointless to respond to this, but I don't support Romney.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWe'll look forward to articles and NR editorials advancing conservative candidates and criticizing Romney then, Ramesh. I've posted links to your Romney love letters before---anyone can use NRO's search feature and judge for themselves.
That Romney, Pawlenty, and Hunstsman as "top-tier candidates" is going to haunt you, though, as are the various "Candidate Y wins but this helps Romney!" commentaries you and Rich churn out and have been remarked upon by any number of commenters.
I'm perfectly willing to stop pointing out your and the others' support for Romney when you actually start supporting a conservative candidate for this nomination---indeed, nothing would please me more as it would mean NR's return to being the flagship of the conservative movement rather than mere GOP cheerleading squad with a curious affinity for the RINO Establishment.
Now is the time.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseTeflon, I believe we ought to honor Ramesh's statement. That said, you're right that Romney is getting a ridiculous amount of support from the supposedly conservative commentariat. Romney is a joke. These polls must be completed by folks in the newsroom and for "balance" by people waiting in the foodstamps line. McCain, Dole, Bush I, Ford. "Moderate" loveable compromisers. The Republican base and wallets are not going to turn out for the author of RomneyCare. Enough of this drivel already.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'd have less problem honoring Ramesh's statement were the evidence not consistently to the contrary. Beau hit it right on the head with his diagnosis of Hugh Hewitt Syndrome: if EVERYTHING that happens in a race is analyzed as "a good thing for Romney"---even things like Michele Bachmann winning the Ames Straw Poll---then you're in the tank for Romney, period.
We're not imagining Ramesh and Rich's infatuation with Romney (K-Lo's quieted down lately on that score). We simply read what they write. Andy McCarthy, Mark Levin, and Mark Steyn likewise are far cooler to the Romney candidacy and for ideological reasons.
The shame of NR under Lowry's tenure is it has ceased to be a magazine concerned with advancing the conservative movement and is simply a Republican Party organ now, complete with inexplicable support for the Rockefeller Wing Buckley himself once repudiated utterly.
O'Sullivan's Law needs a clarification:
"EVEN organizations which are explicitly right wing become left wing over time."
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOf course, if Romney gets a bad coif at some point I'm sure the NRONiks reserve the right to change their minds....
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGood advice for Romney, who in 2008 wouldn't have been smart enough to take. I don't know about Romney circa: 2012.
Perry's only problem is Perry. He can only beat himself. Romney should be smart enough to recognize that. The best thing he(Romney) can do is tend to his own business, and wait for the possible implosion. Yep, for him it's a tough position to be in, but those are the cards he has been dealt.
With respect to Perry's long term viability, I think it's far from certain, but you don't get elected to two-plus terms of Texas without having considerable political skill(s). Of course, Perry has never felt the heat of the national media. It can be withering, just ask Sarah Palin, who in a mere four or five weeks went from superstar to unelectable.
I think if Perry surrounds himself with some competent advisers, and does what he can to rein in his propensity to speak from the cuff using words like "treason" - which is what the far right loves, but the middle probably doesn't - he'll be tough to beat, in both the primary and the general election.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseFrom what I've heard, the TX media can be even more brutal and partisan than the national media.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRomney's campaign reminds me of a scene in the move Memphis Belle. The bomber is over its target. Flak is firing around it. Defending German planes are swooping in.
Once the target is engaged the pilot, played by Matthew Modine, must sit, hope and wait while the bombardier tries to destroy it.
Romney is Matthew Modine, who played the pilot with the Romney-fitting name of Dearborn.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abusegive it a rest teflon. insults are not arguments. remember, our mission has to be to defeat O, not to choose the most conservative republican. Romney would make a much much much better president than the one we have, and since not only conservative republicans vote, he has the best chance to actually win. Go Mitt!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThat is precisely the same argument the RINOs pushed on us in 2008 when McLame ran against The One. You may recall how well that one turned out for us.
The chief weakness Obama had at that time was inexperience. He now has four more years of presidential experience than Mitt Romney has.
You know---Mitt Romney, whom John McLame handily defeated.
Hold onto your RINO Supremacy illusions---voters just keep wiping them away at the ballot box.
You cannot defeat a committed leftist with someone who will say anything to get elected and has no firm principles whatsoever. Defeating Hitler required Churchill, not Chamberlain, and defeating Obama requires someone cut from Reagan's cloth, not Nelson Rockefeller's.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"There are candidates who will have much more credibility to challenge Perry — Bachmann, and Palin if she were to get in — than he does."
Doesn't this state in a nutshell the problem with Romney? If he has less credentials to challenge Perry than Bachmann or Palin, what exactly are his credentials to be president? Granted, Obama didn't exactly set the bar in this department but I prefer to look at that as an aberration than the norm.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSpend all your money on anti-Obama ads, Mitt.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseLowry all but concedes that Romney is a lousy conservative candidate. All he has is electability? What does that say about the conservative movement? I would have thought conservatives would have been in demand like no other time after 3 years of Obama and this economy.
Romney does run on something else though...his private sector experience. A lot of conservatives would vote for Stalin if he had private sector experience.
I always feel a little sick when I see a leading conservative publication advising Romney on campaign strategy.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt's less about Romney per se, than whomever is seen as the GOP establishment candidate, currently Romney. If an establishment GOPer gets into the WH, access for establishment journalists and consultants remains as it is. If a Perry or Palin gets in, that all changes. Access.
There's another race involved, that between the estab GOP and the TP GOP. The recent Gallup poll has 58% of Repubs and right tilting indies supporting the Tea Party, not the old school GOP. This has the old estab GOP quite worried, as it should. Dance. Piper. Pay.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI don't know if it's about access...Lowry and others don't make a living because of interviews with presidents and other pols. This could be a legit argument for somebody like Bill O'Reilly.
Some conservatives and liberals act like the Tea Party is a real political party. It will be difficult for them to go against the GOP once elected if they are still part of the Republican party.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe establishment GOP office holders, and staff, and hangers-on, et al, have their set of favorite journalists and outlets. The Tea Party type new GOPers slowly taking over the party have theirs.
I'm not speaking about specific writers or analysts so much as a general changeover. The smart journalists go Darwin (adapt).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseFrankly, I'm disgusted and shocked by the "slobbering love affair" that many NRO commenters seem to be having over Perry. I'm sure that once the conservative media begin to actually do any responsible (read: as seen through conservative lenses) reporting on the guy, his support will plummet.
Perry is a Marlboro Man rather than a conservative. He has a swagger, wears his Texas duds, and likes to talk about school prayer. But actions speak louder than snakeskin boots. The man was governor of a state. What actual policies did he implement?
-there were jobs, but those were the fruits of previous governors who decided not to have an income tax or become a union closed shop state;
-there was a porous border, an invasion of illegal Mexicans, and ... silence from the governor -- no E-Verify, no state plan whatsoever (and this from the supposed Mr. States' Rights) ... not very encouraging to the rest of the country as we are crushed by illegal immigration;
-no spending cuts;
-no reform of the welfare state;
-all sorts of handouts to connected businesses in crony-capitalist form;
-never pushed on charter schools or other conservative-minded school reform;
-big fiscal deficits.
Basically sounds like every country club RINO GOPer that the Tea Party is supposed to be against. He's G.W. Bush without the foreign policy victories, which is to say a Rockefeller Republican who happens to be from Texas and indulge in that state's cultural quirks.
Bush was not conservative in his domestic policies -- he did, after all, increase spending hugely, fail to cut welfare, and created Medicare Part D. He left a lot of conservatives depressed ... to the point that it took an Obama to wake us up. Bachmann, Romney or (fingers crossed) a Christie or Walker would be infinitely better. Now that we've finally got a moment for conservatism, we can't squander it on this Trojan Horse, this shiny bauble of conservative sizzle but no steak. Seriously.
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